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Mysterious skywriting portends inevitable doom?

That's what the conspiracy theorists would have us think. But the real meaning of yesterday's mysterious sky-message, which appeared over West L.A. at about 1:30pm, is apparently a secret. (For those of you who can't quite make the already-blurring-just-forty-seconds-after-it-appeared message, it reads "Get ready to get real LA.") Five minutes later, it was gone with the wind.

Lacking solid evidence that the message portends apocalypse, here are some fun facts about skywriting:

This is actually a variation on skywriting known as skytyping, which explains why it looks a bit like the product of a dot matrix printer.

Five planes flying in formation created the message, and the oil-and-exhaust mix that makes the smoke is controlled by one trigger on one of the planes.

The message is about five miles wide and 1,500 feet high.

A typical skywritten message costs about $1,000, and lasts between 10-15 minutes, depending on weather conditions.

The first skywriting was done in the 1930s, and were advertisements for Pepsi-Cola.

If any of you have information about our doom, as portended in the sky, please let us know.

Also on Mental Floss:

DID YOU KNOW? Marlon Brando hated memorizing lines so much that he posted cue cards everywhere to help him get through scenes.
He even asked for lines to be written on an actress's posterior. (That request was denied.)